Daniel Dae Kim is back on TV tonight with The Good Doctor. It's been two years since his last major TV role, after his dramatic exit from Hawaii Five-0. But he's actually an executive producer on The Good Doctor, and joins the show in the new role of Dr. Jackson Han in the February 18 episode. Kim is a TV veteran but he admitted to some nerves before joining this series:
I know the quality of David Shore’s writing and I wanted to do it justice. I also wanted to be a good scene partner to all my fellow actors and people that I’d known in a producing capacity, so I wanted to service the show. Because of that, I felt a little bit more butterflies in my stomach than I expected.
Daniel Dae Kim plays the new Chief of Surgery, and apparently his Dr. Jackson Han not only clashes with Freddie Highmore's Dr. Shaun Murphy, he puts Murphy's career in jeopardy. Kim told EW it helped that his first episode was directed by Freddie Highmore, his co-star and a member of The Good Doctor family.
Freddie Highmore told EW having Daniel Dae Kim as a cast member made it easier for him, too, since he wasn't directing a stranger in a new role, he was directing a friend and producer everyone on set already knew well.
Daniel Dae Kim makes his debut in The Good Doctor Season 2, Episode 15, "Risk and Reward," which has this synopsis from ABC:
Shaun's blunt honesty with a distraught mother of a critically ill newborn baby causes the new chief of surgery (Daniel Dae Kim) to question keeping him on as a resident.
Daniel Dae Kim is an ABC veteran after playing Jin-Soo Kwon on Lost from 2004 to 2010. He joined Hawaii Five-0 in 2010 and played Chin Ho Kelly until 2017, exiting the show with co-star Grace Park when contract negotiations fell through.
At the time, Daniel Dae Kim explained that he wouldn't be returning for Hawaii Five-0 Season 8 because he and CBS "weren't able to agree to terms on a new contract, so I made the difficult choice not to continue."
After that, Daniel Dae Kim made headlines for replacing Ed Skrein as Ben Daimio in the upcoming movie Hellboy.
The South Korean-born actor was also the driving force in getting The Good Doctor on ABC. The series is based on an award-winning South Korean TV series, and Daniel Dae Kim got the rights for his production company. Apparently he brought it to his network at the time, CBS, but they decided not to make a pilot. So he struck a deal with Sony Pictures TV and got House creator David Shore on to produce as showrunner, and now here they are -- a big success on ABC.
The Good Doctor Season 2 welcomes Daniel Dae Kim on screen starting tonight (Monday, Feb. 18) at 10 p.m. ET on ABC. Here's what else is playing on the small screen in midseason 2019.
